


everybody knows the fight was fixed

by bladerummy



Category: Barry (TV 2018)
Genre: Drabble Sequence, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-02
Packaged: 2020-11-22 04:04:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20867909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bladerummy/pseuds/bladerummy
Summary: “I’m not gay, but I really want to fuck you man, in like- the gay way.”Albert laughs like that’s stupidest shit he’s ever heard, hard enough that Barry believes it too.





	everybody knows the fight was fixed

**Author's Note:**

> if you say "who is albert" i don't think you really watch this show (or you haven't seen season 2, in which case, get out of here.) anyway, please enjoy! i made myself sad writing this! i wish i was better at writing comedy!

The first time Barry’s kissed by Albert, he almost pukes. That’s not a metaphor for how he felt at the time, the bile was actually waiting in his throat, burning like he’d just cracked open a cyanide capsule. You know, the kind governments plant in the back molars of their shitty spies, encouraging them to die before they turn to gossip. Barry almost pukes all over himself and dying like that becomes a fantasy. 

Albert doesn’t seem to notice, or if he does, he’s being nice and playing dumb. He’s not stricken at all, not like Barry feels and probably looks. He doesn’t ask ‘you good?’ but he pats Barry’s cheek, and it means the same thing without all the embarrassment.  
—

Fuches joined the Marines for him, Barry’s body is just along for the ride. If he had joined up of his own volition (unlikely), it would have been exclusively with the intent to make friends. High School was lonely, the couple years he spent at College somehow even lonelier. If he didn’t have a squad of men to be buddies with by default (and buddies is already a bit of a stretch in some cases), he’d be at his loneliest now. Chris was the first to talk to him, Albert was the first to touch him. Just a friendly arm slung around his shoulder and suddenly he didn’t feel like such a total waste of space. 

—

“I’m not gay, but I really want to fuck you man, in like- the gay way.”  
Albert laughs like that’s stupidest shit he’s ever heard, hard enough that Barry believes it too. Maybe he really is thick as a brick for thinking gay feelings are any different than normal feelings. Does it matter who makes your heart jump or your dick hard when what you’re left with is the exact same shit? It’d be healthy to chase the thought further down the rabbit hole, but it’s interrupted by Albert, and Albert is pinning him to the military grade cot. He says “it’s okay to be gay, man,” and Barry takes his head in his hands and kisses him so hard that he splits his own lip.  
They fuck, of course, in like- the “normal” way. 

Halfway through getting redressed Albert pulls Barry in by the collar, close enough that their foreheads knock. He doesn’t say anything and Barry doesn’t say anything, they just stand like that- sharing the silence, not caring that they each smell like shit. It’s nice feeling like he doesn’t have to talk, a weight off his fucking broad shoulders. Barry doesn’t actually talk a lot of the time, but he always feels like he should. 

—

“What’re you gonna do when you get home, like when you get back?”  
“Open a restaurant.”  
“No shit.”  
“Yeah, fucking farm to table. I think I’d make a goddamn killing in Portland.”  
“Portland?”“Yeah, you ever heard of fucking Portland, Oregon, B?”  
“Fucking of course.”  
“Good, ‘cause you’d always eat free, but first you’d need to know how to fucking get there.”  
“Shit man, always?”  
“Fucking always.”

—

Chris tries to understand, he really does. He says he’d do the same if his girlfriend got shot, which only makes things weirder and worse, because Barry and Albert were never dating in the first place. They never talked about being anything more than Barry and Albert, not even when they were delirious on two hours of sleep passing dreams of being stateside back and forth. They never talked about ending things either, taking comfort in whatever they had being constant even if it was unknowable. They’d be the same in New York or Wisconsin as they were here.

Chris pulls him into a hug and Barry immediately pulls himself away, feeling like his skeleton’s jumped out of his skin on contact. That’s new, he’d never really minded being touched before, always having looked for validation in a pat on the back- would even settle for a noogie if that’s all that was on the table. Maybe this means he’s not meant to be touched anymore, he had his time in the sun and now it’s over. Isn’t it selfish to expect he’d get anything more? Does he even really deserve more? Chris looks taken aback, but not enough that he bothers to try again. He rummages around his pockets instead, pulling out a hankie for Barry to ‘dry his eyes,’ even though Barry can’t remember when he began crying. 

—

The KIA bracelet stays on in the shower, stays on at night, stays on at 3am while he jerks off in a shitty motel room with a thousand yard stare.  
Would Albert be disappointed in him? Would he? Would he?He doesn’t know the answer, and not knowing makes him scared that he never really knew Albert at all, and suddenly he is spiraling and there’s fresh blood on his hands and he needs to get the fuck home and sleep for a month. 

Fuches reminds him that he can’t take this shit with him to a military hospital. A therapist can’t get Barry any clarity without what happened in Korengal, and what happened in Korengal would cut all the strings Fuches pulled to have him discharged in a semi-honorable fashion. Independent therapists who don’t give two fucks about that kind of thing are an option, but Fuches forgets, maybe intentionally, and so does Barry. 

—

He’s in his dreams sometimes. Albert will call him an asshole, and touch his arm or his face, and Barry will wake up scratching a rash into his skin. They’re not nightmares though. The real nightmare would be if Albert stopped showing up. That’d mean something, Barry’s not sure what, but he knows it’d be bad. He wants to feel the guilt, anyway. He feels good feeling guilty, like the sting of pressing your finger on a bruise, a button to remind him that he’s not completely cold blooded.

—

“Do you think I’m dumb, like stupid stupid?”  
“I think you’re dumb but I don’t think you’re stupid. Why, did someone fucking say something to you?”  
“No, I’ve just been having a lot of stupid fucking thoughts, man. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know anything at all.”  
“We all have stupid fucking thoughts, B. If anyone tells you you’re stupid, you tell me, and I’ll kick their dumb fucking ass into next Tuesday.”  
“Ditto, man.” “Sure, but no one’s calling me stupid, I’m a fucking genius.”  
“Yeah man, sometimes you fucking are.”


End file.
